


Studies at the Court of Kublai Khan

by Lady_of_the_Flowers



Category: Marco Polo (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-19
Updated: 2015-03-19
Packaged: 2018-03-18 14:09:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3572510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_of_the_Flowers/pseuds/Lady_of_the_Flowers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is no sin in remembering the curve of Jingim’s chin and the set of his mouth, only in loving them, and for that Marco is guilty.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Studies at the Court of Kublai Khan

**Author's Note:**

> pre-slash, of a kind (maybe with more to follow)

I.

He sees the prince last among all the splendors of the Khan’s court, but once he does, he cannot look away. There is nothing remarkable about Jingim’s clothing or bearing, nothing that would advertise his station besides where he sits, irresistibly golden, at the Khan’s side, hair swept up into a topknot unlike the Mongol tonsure and setting him apart from the man Marco will soon learn is his father. There are many things which set Prince Jingim apart from his father and every one a burr against the prince’s skin. It does not take Marco long to realize this.

What does take time is learning the intricacies of court life, all the family ties which bind and fray, the delicate balance between order and chaos which every man—and woman—must play their part in maintaining. Marco has never been to court before now. He is a merchant, son of a merchant, from a family of merchants. A venerable enough profession in Venice, where profit reigns, but here he is nothing. Or less than nothing. A slave to be directed at will, dependent on the Khan’s favor for his life. He forgets to bow and speaks out of turn, he knows names but not faces, faces but not names, and all the foreign words he mumbles under his breath run through his head in sleep like a fever dream. What remains through the confusion, through the fear and the waiting, is the prince’s solemn face, expressions occasionally flickering across it as if at a great distance from their source. This, he has memorized even in his short time in Cambulac. This, he has set down on paper, telling himself it is but one study among many, a record of his time at the Khan’s great court. But he knows this is a lie even as he thinks it. The pages of his journal, if anyone were to discover them, would be enough to damn him as he is damned already, though none yet know it but himself.

There is no sin in remembering the curve of Jingim’s chin and the set of his mouth, only in loving them, and for that Marco is guilty.

 

II.          

The Chinese painter—an even less willing hostage than most at Kublai’s court—has been teaching him to paint perfect new truths and lies with his brush, a far cry from the blank faces of angels and saints in what few manuscripts Marco has seen back in Venice. Too inexperienced yet to use pigments, Marco is content with a set of fine-tipped brushes given as a gift by the Khan so that he may set down on paper what wonders there are among the Mongols. Thus far, the wonders include:

Jingim dismounting painfully from his horse and walking towards the palace doors in a daze, rain-soaked and bloody, streaks of hair plastered to his forehead. Exhausted by defeat. A private moment Marco had no business seeing through the stable window.

Jingim turning to him, saffron-yellow robe obscured by furs the color of the dry steppes, long hair loose and tangled about his shoulders, “Beware, Polo. Your words can get you killed.”

Jingim’s quiet, desperate rage in the Khan’s hall. The blaze of his dark eyes.

Jingim on a white horse, a bright sun on this cloudy day, cruel and silent. No brushwork could ever be enough.

 

III.               

He came here seeking adventure and he has found it, close to death with the feel of Jingim’s blade against his neck. He gulps down air as if it will save him, though he knows it will not. He burns, and it is with shame compounded by the knowledge that he has spoken against the Khan’s own brother and humiliated Jingim publically. For this he does not expect to be forgiven. But he looks into Jingim’s eyes and thinks _I wish to live only so that my last vision will not be of your anger, though I may die today on the floor of Hundred-Eye’s training room._

He does not die. Instead, he is vindicated and Jingim’s resentment cloaked in hatred grows stronger. This is not how he would have things be between them, but he is powerless to wield anything besides words, and only then at the Khan’s command. So he waits for a chance to right this one wrong among many, training and speaking when bidden and wishing that the images which come to mind when he seeks release alone in bed would belong to the Blue Princess and not her sunlit counterpart; that his thoughts might wander only at night and not during the day.

 

IV. 

It is no easy thing growing up in the shadow of the Khan and the legacy of the Mongols, and Prince Jingim shows the strain more and more as time passes. Or perhaps Marco is simply better at noticing it. At the feast held in Kublai’s honor and attended by Jingim instead, Marco sits at a low outdoor table with Byomba and eats, rich food growing foul in his mouth as he listens to Lord Kaidu insult the prince again and again, mocking him for his defeat. He wonders how long Jingim will stay silent and accept the pitying glances of his wife, whose hand hovers above his knee as if she wishes to comfort him but knows it will be taken badly. If Marco had his journal now, he might record the tension in Jingim’s shoulders and how the light fails to soften his frozen features (a mask, concealing embarrassment), though his hand would be shaky from airag and the likeness, as always, would be untrue.

He has sworn to protect the Khan’s interests and by extension, Jingim’s too. If the Khan meant this as an exercise in humiliation, it has succeeded. If he hoped it would spur Jingim to action, at the very least in self-defense, he was mistaken. Jingim stands abruptly from the table, the shame of being compared to a woman and found wanting apparently too great a shame to swallow, but facing Kaidu leaves him paralyzed, words—words Marco could make so much of, if only he had the chance—trapped in his throat. It is in Prince Jingim’s interest that someone speak for him, and Marco is willing to be his voice.

“We _are_ one wrestler short, Prince.” Kaidu says pleasantly, as if he has not been inciting the prince all evening, “Care to test your skills? Show us the aggression in _your_ blood.”

“I would be honored, Lord Kaidu.” Marco says before Jingim can speak, and rises to his feet.

He makes a fool of himself in the ring and the Mongols seem to find it good sport. They always do. The hapless Latin, pitted against their ways and bound to fail, has become an old joke by now. He bites the dust, tastes it on his tongue, and Khutulun smiles as she helps him back up. He has been compared to a woman and found wanting. It does not sting as much as it could. He is used to losing.

The prince does not look his way even once but that, at least for tonight, is hardly the point.

 

V. 

It seems as though what began badly will end badly too. Unwilling to be the messenger of ill tidings, Marco is caught in a lie and watches, speechless at last, as the Khan kills a man before his very eyes. Kaidu did not treat the prince with respect. He could have said that much and spared a man’s life. He could have admitted that much weakness in Jingim’s armor. If the Khan already knew the truth then telling him would not have been a betrayal. Marco is a fool and he curses himself for it as he walks the corridors of the palace to his own quarters against the outer wall. Airag stirs sour in his belly. He wishes he could expel it along with all his useless feelings. Then he might not dread the return to his own solitary bed.

He sits on the edge of his bed and undresses slowly, tired and still in shock from the sight of blood pooling on the floor, the Khan standing bent over the body. Death has ever been his companion since his mother joined the Virgin in heaven, but that does not mean it gets easier watching life leave another’s limbs. At times like these, he wishes he could follow the Three Sisters home, but he cannot also shrink the world now that he knows it to be large. This place will not cease to exist simply because he has left it, there will always be the Khan and the war and the prince’s displeasure.

A noise outside his door startles him from his thoughts.

“Who’s there?” Marco calls out, reaching for his knife. He is glad he does not find it when the door opens and he sees the prince wreathed in shadow, drawing near with unsteady gait—drunker now than he was at the feast.

“What are you doing here?” Marco asks before he can curb his tongue. The prince ignores his question.

“I don’t need your pity, Latin.” He says savagely, “I can manage my own affairs.”

“It was not pity.” Marco begins and is interrupted.

“I swore last time that I would kill you if you humiliated me again.” He has come to Marco’s room carrying a sword, the bare blade dragging against the wooden floor. This is it. He has gone too far. His thoughts of home seem silly now. 

“I only sought to _spare_ you humiliation, Prince. If I did otherwise, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize.” Jingim snaps, and raises the sword to dig into Marco’s chest, “ _Beg me_. Beg me to spare your life. Or are you too good for that? Others have done it before you.”

“I am at your mercy.” Marco bows his head, the sharpened tip already piercing through his skin, and sees the corner of his journal peeking from beneath his bed. He kicks it back into its hiding place, and Jingim’s bleary eyes catch the movement.

“What is that?” He bends down in a sweep of bronze silk and black hair, holding the blade in place, and retrieves the journal, “A log of your travels? What, I wonder, do you have written about me in here? _The Great Khan’s heir is undeserving and weak. He cannot lead his people into glory._ Is that what you would have the people in your land know of me?”

“ _No_.” Marco raises his head, and meets Jingim’s gaze, “Never that. Please, give it to me. Let me read it to you, you will see—“

“And trust the silver-tongued foreigner not to lie?” The prince laughs, an unhappy sound, and tosses the journal away, “Don’t think you will get out of death so easily.”

“Jingim— _Prince_ —you have my loyalty. Now, and always.” The prince’s eyes are bright with unshed tears and he sees now, for the first time, truly how afraid Jingim is of his own failure, “You are the rightful heir to the Great Khan. That remains true whether you kill me or not.”

“Your words are worthless to me.” Jingim sneers, but the longer he delays, the more his hand trembles. The tremor moves up his arm and sends the sword clattering to the floor. He looks down at it in disbelief, like his body has betrayed him—a sentiment Marco is familiar with. He exhales loudly and runs a weary hand over his eyes, “I should not have come. I’m drunk.” Marco laughs softly, cannot help himself, because he is drunk too.

Jingim kneels again, but now fingers instead of a blade press against the shallow wound, staunching the trickle of blood flowing from the region of Marco’s heart. The gesture is startlingly tender and Marco’s breath catches in his throat. He aches to run his hands along the broad stretch of Jingim’s shoulders, to cup his chin and draw it nearer, to feel sweet breath on his lips. Jingim looks up in sudden concern, “Have I hurt you?”

“No, Prince. I am well.” This, too, he will remember; the lovely line of Jingim’s neck bent before him as he swipes at the blood with the sleeve of Marco’s best shirt.

“I will not speak of this if you do not.” Jingim says decisively, sounding as if he has mastered himself again, until he sits back on his heels and loses his balance. He falls heavily onto his elbow then rights himself, eyes flashing with equal parts frustration and amusement, “Tomorrow all will be forgotten, even my clumsiness.”

“A fair promise.” Marco says, and a long moment of silence draws out between them. He has an idea, rash though it may be, that Jingim is waiting for something. A word or a signal. He would be the greatest coward not to try. So, ever willing to step into danger, he reaches out to brush tentative fingers down Jingim’s smooth cheek and Jingim lets him, flinching only a little, gazing up with something akin to relief. 


End file.
